Rachel and Tamar: The Influence of religious persecution in Candide

Candide is related to the Africa project, because a recurring them in Candide is religious persecution. As we learned while researching for Africa, there is religious persecution in many regions. Both the characters in Candide, and Nathaniel from the Poisonwood Bible are used to criticize the fanatic church members.

When answering questions encountered while reading Candide, a common thread is found involving religious persecution. According to Ayala and Tsipora, who researched the time period of Voltaire's authoring of Candide, there was much religious persecution in France at the time.  The Jesuits, as well as other religious groups, were killed on account of their religious beliefs. Talia and Raquel pondered the question of what motivated Voltaire's writing of Candide. They found that through satire Voltaire could express his contempt toward religious persecutors. Voltaire's motives to write Candide were heavily influenced by his need to express his feeling toward religious persecutions during his life.  In our research we found that the portrayal of the religious persecution in the novel is similar in the Poisonwood Bible as well as in Africa today.